1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains to imagery processing, and, more particularly, to a technique for adding new content to an information store comprised of imagery.
2. Description of the Related Art
Some imaging applications fuse multiple images to create a composite, or mosaic, of images larger than any single constituent image. In some of these applications, the image content of the composite or mosaic image may need to be updated or otherwise changed. One way to do this is to take new images and fuse, or “paste”, them into the mosaic to update the mosaic with the content of the new image.
There are a number of issues that may arise, however. It sometimes is very difficult to exactly reproduce the conditions under which the original imagery was acquired when acquiring the new image. For example, many applications use “overhead imagery”, or images acquired from an airborne or space-based platform. It can be very difficult to exactly reproduce the parameters of the first acquisition in the second acquisition. The altitude or perhaps the elevation angle between the sensor and the ground features may be a little bit different. In some applications, even slight deviations in these kinds of parameters can cause difficulties.
Even if those conditions can be reproduced well, the new image must be accurately pasted into the corresponding location in the mosaic. One aspect of this process is known as “registering”, which is essentially alignment. More particularly, the new image must be correctly and accurately registered with the correct location on the mosaic prior to be pasted, or fused, into the mosaic. Improper registration can sometimes invalidate the content of the mosaic in that location. This can reduce the usefulness of the mosaic for its intended purpose and, sometimes, ruin its efficacy.
The present invention is directed to resolving, or at least reducing, one or all of the problems mentioned above.